I very rarely see any of the other players, where are you all hanging out at? whats the most popular area?

I don't think there are enough people to designate anywhere a 'most popular' area. Besides that not enough time has passed for people to even find such an area.

Look around station in homesectors. That's about it.

The Vendetta universe is awfully big, so you might not see many people ingame. However, when stress testing begins, there will be alot more people. And there is no immediate "most popular area". People just wander around as they please, exploring the universe.

While it's certainly not a "hot-spot", Odia M-14 has become something of a hang out point.

Or perhaps this is just my opinion.

Well, all I know its the home of the ISN. I should go and check it out sometime.

The way the universe is shaped, there aren't really any places that are convenient for everyone to go just to muck around. It couldn't be the southern tip of Serco space 'cause then the really bad Itani would have to go ALL the way around, and vice-versa with the southern tip of Itani space. Having it smack in the middle of the south would be equally a pain in the rear for Serco and Itani, but that's still a pain.

Adding onto what electric said, with the loss of a central "s9" system/sector, there probably wont be a multi-national hangout anymore, since after all, it is extremely unfeasible for everyone to congregate at a point.

As for current "luke warm" spots...I'd say that there aren't ANY. period. Even the national homestations are virtually abandoned except for the National DefBot patrols.

In an estimated 9 hours of online time since the introduction, I've actually encountered only 2 other human beings, and I was running all throughout Serco Space and several ventures to the South and one real flight through NT Space.

I've been to every system, and almost every station, and I've encountered somewhere between 8 and 12 human players. 3 of them were pirates. 2 of them were absolutely silent, and probably afk. So I've encountered between 3 and 7 useful human players. HOWEVER, this is not entirely because of the new universe. When I'm online, active players usually only notes 20 or so people online, which isn't much compared to the 60 of 3.4.0...

I've had the opposite experience, Pyro...I've run into lots of pilots...some of them in the most out-of-the-way sectors, also.

The buddy system and grouping go a long way in helping people hook up.